What prompted this question? Well recently I bought some lumber of white
ash, plus hickory plus white oak and various others. I do not believe
the data on strength of wood is accurate and am wanting to test these
woods myself. I believe oak is stronger than hickory. I believe the
strength of hickory is a sales hype. The reason I say this is because in
history trebuchets were built out of oak and not hickory even though
England had hickory species and ash species. And because the growth
pattern of oaks allows horizontal branches which means the wood has to
be tougher and stronger to grow horizontal. I also want to test spruce
for strength because a spruce bears the full force of wind so its wood
must be strong.

But the question that rose in my mind is whether GreenAsh came first in
geologic history or whether WhiteAsh and which mutated and gave rise to
the other?

I accept Darwin Evolution theory only as a algorithm or rule and not as
a theory. Let me call it the Darwin-Evolution-Rule. So according to that
Rule, which of the ashes existed first? Was it GreenAsh that mutated to
create the WhiteAsh species or vice versa?

If I had to guess I would say the WhiteAsh came first and gave rise to
the GreenAsh and I would guess that because the GreenAsh has a wider
range of habitat. Because in the Rule of its survival of the fittest it
is less likely for a species to give rise to a weaker species that
thence increases its range of habitat. Based on *likelihood*.

Question: what is in the genetics of GreenAsh that it can live
where-ever WhiteAsh lives and then some more? Is it that GreenAsh is
less picky as to pH soil conditions? Is it that GreenAsh can take wind
better than WhiteAsh? Is it that GreenAsh can survive with less water?

So I wonder if a Genome project can be run on GreenAsh and WhiteAsh and
whether the genome can date whether GreenAsh was a mutation of WhiteAsh
and has now become the dominant ash species?

I am thinking that DNA is a fossil record itself and can tell us which
species of two contending species came first.

And this DNA dating is very important for the human species itself in
that it can tell us that Stonethrowing came before bipedalism and
created bipedalism.

Archimedes Plutonium
www.iw.net/~a_plutonium
whole entire Universe is just one big atom where dots
of the electron-dot-cloud are galaxies

Archimedes Plutonium schreef
The reason I say this is because in
history trebuchets were built out of oak and not hickory even though
England had hickory species and ash species.

***
England has no hickory species (perhaps you are confusing England with
China), but yes hickory is stronger than oak. A matter of record.
PvR

In article , Archimedes Plutonium
writes
England had hickory species

There were no hickories (Carya) in England during historical times until
they were introduced from America. There are no Carya species native to
Europe (1 native to China, 1 to Tonkin, the remainder to North America)
so it's likely that hickories have been absent from England for a long
time. Googling finds sites that report that Carya has been extinct in
Europe for 2 million years.
--
Stewart Robert Hinsley

Chickens and eqgs ought to be asked that question. They have more experience
:=)

Bill

On Sat, 09 Oct 2004 12:01:12 -0500, Archimedes Plutonium
wrote:

What prompted this question? Well recently I bought some lumber of white
ash, plus hickory plus white oak and various others. I do not believe
the data on strength of wood is accurate and am wanting to test these
woods myself. I believe oak is stronger than hickory. I believe the
strength of hickory is a sales hype.

I can tell you that most types of hickory are harder to split than
most types of oak. This bears mostly on the degree of crosslinking
(cross grain fibers) in the wood.

England had hickory species and ash species. And because the growth
pattern of oaks allows horizontal branches which means the wood has to
be tougher and stronger to grow horizontal.

This is a nice theory, but I don't think it holds up well in reality.
American Elm, which bears limbs mostly erectly, is one of the toughest
woods around. I would defy anyone to hand split an 18" x 18" diameter
log down the middle.

Steve Turner

Stewart Robert Hinsley wrote:

In article , Archimedes Plutonium
writes
England had hickory species

There were no hickories (Carya) in England during historical times until
they were introduced from America. There are no Carya species native to
Europe (1 native to China, 1 to Tonkin, the remainder to North America)
so it's likely that hickories have been absent from England for a long
time. Googling finds sites that report that Carya has been extinct in
Europe for 2 million years.
--
Stewart Robert Hinsley

I had a mind glitch when I wrote that. I was thinking at that moment that
Butternut was a Carya species and that England has butternuts. But I was
totally mistaken.

Anyway getting back to the issue of test of strength of woods, the white
ash I have is heavier and denser than the hickory and both are reported to
be stronger than oak. So England had no hickories for trebuchets but they
surely had ash trees. Whether they had both White and Green Ash, I do not
know. But if Ash is nearly equivalent to hickory in terms of strength, then
why did they build the trebuchets out of oak when ash was available?

My guess is that oak is superior to various tests of strength and that
strength relies on various dimensions and tests. For example, the test of
placing boards of white oak, white ash and hickory of equal length width
and depth and adding weights to the end of the board until the board snaps.
I would guess oak outlasts the hickory and whiteash. Then there is the
projectile test of which is least impervious to a projectile. Then there is
the durability test for it seems as though oak lasts longer as a flooring
then does hickory which seems to peel off in long splinters.

Archimedes Plutonium
www.iw.net/~a_plutonium
whole entire Universe is just one big atom where dots
of the electron-dot-cloud are galaxies

P van Rijckevorsel wrote:

Archimedes Plutonium schreef
The reason I say this is because in
history trebuchets were built out of oak and not hickory even though
England had hickory species and ash species.

***
England has no hickory species (perhaps you are confusing England with
China), but yes hickory is stronger than oak. A matter of record.
PvR

I was confusing Butternut as being a Carya species.

But never mind my mistake.

It is more important to be able to use the Genome Project on the two ash
species since they are so similar. To use that A,C,T,G coding as if it
was a fossil record itself. To decipher from the A,C,T,G which came
first, the Green Ash or the White Ash and which mutated giving rise to
the other species.

The Genome Project is relatively new and has a huge potential of being a
fossil recorder of the ancient geological past history. Those A,C,T,G
codings should be able to date one species from another species and tell
us which was the parent-species.

This should be of great importance to the science of anthropology in that
we can unravel the A,C,T,G that is bipedalism and why chimps do not have
bipedalism and thus work backwards showing that chimps throw underarm but
not overarm and because throwing precedes bipedalism. So as the chimps
continue to get better at throwing they eventually (given about 2 to 3
million years and if humans were not around to extinct them) will become
bipedal from their throwing behaviour.

I pick on the Ash species to make a Genome-Fossil check because I am
guessing that the genome of WhiteAsh to GreenAsh is almost identical.
Moreso than the genome difference between chimpanzee and human.

Sometime in the future there will be a stunning news report that uses the
Genome of one species to indicate the evolutionary history of a similar
species. That uses the Genome as a Fossil record. And I think Ash would
be a nice candidate.

Archimedes Plutonium
www.iw.net/~a_plutonium
whole entire Universe is just one big atom where dots
of the electron-dot-cloud are galaxies

Archimedes Plutonium schreef
I was confusing Butternut as being a Carya species.

* * *
Yes, oak is stronger than butternut.
No, England does not have butternuts.
PvR

In article , Archimedes Plutonium
writes

Anyway getting back to the issue of test of strength of woods, the white
ash I have is heavier and denser than the hickory and both are reported to
be stronger than oak. So England had no hickories for trebuchets but they
surely had ash trees. Whether they had both White and Green Ash, I do not
know. But if Ash is nearly equivalent to hickory in terms of strength, then
why did they build the trebuchets out of oak when ash was available?

England has neither white nor green ash; both are American species.
Rather than speculating you could find a web site which lists the trees
native to Britain (there's appreciably less than 100). You might also
note that there's very few (perhaps ever zero) species of tree native to
both Britain and North America.
--
Stewart Robert Hinsley

. I do not believe
the data on strength of wood is accurate and am wanting to test these
woods myself. I believe oak is stronger than hickory.

The mechanical properties of native hardwood species of wood are well known,
true hickories are "stronger" than white oaks. Do include black locust in your
trials, now that would give the hickory some competition.

Archimedes Plutonium wrote in message ...
What prompted this question? Well recently I bought some lumber of white
ash, plus hickory plus white oak and various others. I do not believe
the data on strength of wood is accurate and am wanting to test these
woods myself. I believe oak is stronger than hickory. I believe the
strength of hickory is a sales hype. The reason I say this is because in
history trebuchets were built out of oak and not hickory even though
England had hickory species and ash species. And because the growth
pattern of oaks allows horizontal branches which means the wood has to
be tougher and stronger to grow horizontal. I also want to test spruce
for strength because a spruce bears the full force of wind so its wood
must be strong.

But the question that rose in my mind is whether GreenAsh came first in
geologic history or whether WhiteAsh and which mutated and gave rise to
the other?

I accept Darwin Evolution theory only as a algorithm or rule and not as
a theory. Let me call it the Darwin-Evolution-Rule. So according to that
Rule, which of the ashes existed first? Was it GreenAsh that mutated to
create the WhiteAsh species or vice versa?

That's a good thing, since that's what Darwin eventually
accepted it as. After he rediscovered that Galopagos
Turtle and Albatros eggs, are not only not warm-blooded,
or mammals, they are like many trees, and philosphers of evolution:

Tepid, Flaky, and lost in the woods, unscientific,
memoryless, and stupid. Since neither trees
not grasses have cells, like the evolutionary bacteria
that eats then do. They have very abrasive cellulose.

And the reason that the data on both ash and hickory
is incomplete, and will remain forver incomplete
is for the reason that trees have no strength.
They have a rigidity index, that allows them to survive on
the slopes of volcanoes. Which is why they are the
only things on Earth that are as old as rock jokes
and volcanoes. Since trees are just like grasses,
they don't evolve. They go whereever the wind
pushes and pulls them. Be it solar wind, or atmospheric wind.
And they are no more evolutionary advanced than
the granite and sandstone rocks that they roost on.


If I had to guess I would say the WhiteAsh came first and gave rise to
the GreenAsh and I would guess that because the GreenAsh has a wider
range of habitat. Because in the Rule of its survival of the fittest it
is less likely for a species to give rise to a weaker species that
thence increases its range of habitat. Based on *likelihood*.

But ash are not really trees. They are strains, or hybrids
of trees. Since they are some of the few species
of trees, that their bark is infinately more valuable
than their leaves.

IntarsiaCo wrote:

. I do not believe
the data on strength of wood is accurate and am wanting to test these
woods myself. I believe oak is stronger than hickory.

The mechanical properties of native hardwood species of wood are well known,
true hickories are "stronger" than white oaks. Do include black locust in your
trials, now that would give the hickory some competition.

The thing I remember most about locust is when I apply a chainsaw it feels as if
I am bouncing on a rock and not wood.

But anyway, I am set to apply various tests on whiteAsh, whiteOak, Hickory,
locust, elm, mulberry, blackwalnut, cedar, redwood, spruce and other woods.

I suspect the old tests are not scientific enough and pandering to a sales
industry where hickory is promoted.

I believe the test for strength is multidimensional and that hickory surpasses
one test of shock absorbing and on the basis of just that one superiorty bracket
it is called the strongest when in fact it is not the strongest in various other
tests.

One test already shows that my hickory is inferior in strength to whiteAsh and
whiteOak in the tendency of hickory to peal off in huge long splinters so that if
a flooring were made of hickory would not outlast oak.

And obviously hickory grows branches that are seldom horizontal whereas Oak, and
they call it "spooky oak not for nothing" can grow branches horizontal to the
ground indicates enormous strength in wood. And Ash seems better able to grow
horizontal than hickory, so in another test of strength oak should excel both
whiteAsh and Hickory in that category.

Obviously spruce is dense in form and its wood must reflect its ability to
withstand huge winds as the saying goes "you cannot throw a cat throw a spruce
tree". So it gives good reason as to why airplane builders prized spruce wood. So
that perhaps given the weight per strength category spruce may outbest even the
hardwoods.

I am going to test locust after I get a equal test piece, but I already know one
superior strength test of locust in that it dulls my chainsaw or any saw faster
than any wood I know of.

Soon I should have some numbers data on strength such as a weight-flex test, a
penetration test, a density test, etc.


Archimedes Plutonium
www.iw.net/~a_plutonium
whole entire Universe is just one big atom where dots
of the electron-dot-cloud are galaxies

Wed, 13 Oct 2004 02:44:55 -0500 Archimedes Plutonium wrote:

IntarsiaCo wrote:

. I do not believe
the data on strength of wood is accurate and am wanting to test these
woods myself. I believe oak is stronger than hickory.

The mechanical properties of native hardwood species of wood are well known,
true hickories are "stronger" than white oaks. Do include black locust in your
trials, now that would give the hickory some competition.

The thing I remember most about locust is when I apply a chainsaw it feels as if
I am bouncing on a rock and not wood.

But anyway, I am set to apply various tests on whiteAsh, whiteOak, Hickory,
locust, elm, mulberry, blackwalnut, cedar, redwood, spruce and other woods.

I suspect the old tests are not scientific enough and pandering to a sales
industry where hickory is promoted.

I believe the test for strength is multidimensional and that hickory surpasses
one test of shock absorbing and on the basis of just that one superiorty bracket
it is called the strongest when in fact it is not the strongest in various other
tests.

One test already shows that my hickory is inferior in strength to whiteAsh and
whiteOak in the tendency of hickory to peal off in huge long splinters so that if
a flooring were made of hickory would not outlast oak.

And obviously hickory grows branches that are seldom horizontal whereas Oak, and
they call it "spooky oak not for nothing" can grow branches horizontal to the
ground indicates enormous strength in wood. And Ash seems better able to grow
horizontal than hickory, so in another test of strength oak should excel both
whiteAsh and Hickory in that category.

Obviously spruce is dense in form and its wood must reflect its ability to
withstand huge winds as the saying goes "you cannot throw a cat throw a spruce
tree". So it gives good reason as to why airplane builders prized spruce wood. So
that perhaps given the weight per strength category spruce may outbest even the
hardwoods.

I am going to test locust after I get a equal test piece, but I already know one
superior strength test of locust in that it dulls my chainsaw or any saw faster
than any wood I know of.

Soon I should have some numbers data on strength such as a weight-flex test, a
penetration test, a density test, etc.

Today I have some numbers:

I took 3 boards of 4,000 mm long by 170 mm wide by 25 mm thick of WhiteOak, Hickory
and WhiteAsh and put them through various tests of strength.

A weight test where a weight is placed in the middle of the board and WhiteAsh
flexed off center by 145 mm and Hickory flexed 106 mm and Oak flexed 70 mm. So Oak
is clearly the strongest and not Hickory!

I am guessing the literature puts hickory as stronger than oak and the only reason I
can think of this bias and untruth is perhaps for sales of hickory wood by the huge
lumber industry of hickory versus whiteoak.

I ran a density test because flex strength is dependent on density and WhiteOak won
again for the Hickory was 97% as dense as WhiteOak and the WhiteAsh was 95% as dense
as WhiteOak.

Finally I ran a penetration test for strength by shooting BBs into the wood and
WhiteOak won this test also but surprizingly WhiteAsh won over Hickory, however it
appeared that WhiteAsh splinters more often than does hickory in penetration tests
and does not leave a nice smooth depression.

My tests confirm the obvious facts of Nature itself. Anyone can observe that only
WhiteOak is able to grow with branches horizontal to ground and so the wood must be
stronger in order to hold up that weight whereas Hickory and WhiteAsh tend to grow
branches more vertical because of a wood that is less strong as WhiteOak. This
*Nature's Obvious Test* is reconfirmed in the evergreen softwoods in that Colorado
BlueSpruce is the strongest per weight and that this tree is very dense exposed to
*wind force* and so the wood has to be extra strong to bear the wind forces. I have
not located a bluespruce board to test and perhaps most people just do not want to
lose their beautiful Colorado BlueSpruce and in fact I can more easily find Redwood
than ColoradoBlueSpruce.

So what my missive above hopefully generates is for some "real scientists" and not
some lumber sales people go back and really do a great job as to the strength of
woods. Because, hey, Nature itself implies that BlueSpruce and WhiteOak **are likely
to be** superior.


Archimedes Plutonium
www.iw.net/~a_plutonium
whole entire Universe is just one big atom where dots
of the electron-dot-cloud are galaxies

Archimedes Plutonium wrote:
Wed, 13 Oct 2004 02:44:55 -0500 Archimedes Plutonium wrote:


IntarsiaCo wrote:


. I do not believe
the data on strength of wood is accurate and am wanting to test these
woods myself. I believe oak is stronger than hickory.

The mechanical properties of native hardwood species of wood are well known,
true hickories are "stronger" than white oaks. Do include black locust in your
trials, now that would give the hickory some competition.

The thing I remember most about locust is when I apply a chainsaw it feels as if
I am bouncing on a rock and not wood.

But anyway, I am set to apply various tests on whiteAsh, whiteOak, Hickory,
locust, elm, mulberry, blackwalnut, cedar, redwood, spruce and other woods.

I suspect the old tests are not scientific enough and pandering to a sales
industry where hickory is promoted.

I believe the test for strength is multidimensional and that hickory surpasses
one test of shock absorbing and on the basis of just that one superiorty bracket
it is called the strongest when in fact it is not the strongest in various other
tests.

One test already shows that my hickory is inferior in strength to whiteAsh and
whiteOak in the tendency of hickory to peal off in huge long splinters so that if
a flooring were made of hickory would not outlast oak.

And obviously hickory grows branches that are seldom horizontal whereas Oak, and
they call it "spooky oak not for nothing" can grow branches horizontal to the
ground indicates enormous strength in wood. And Ash seems better able to grow
horizontal than hickory, so in another test of strength oak should excel both
whiteAsh and Hickory in that category.

Obviously spruce is dense in form and its wood must reflect its ability to
withstand huge winds as the saying goes "you cannot throw a cat throw a spruce
tree". So it gives good reason as to why airplane builders prized spruce wood. So
that perhaps given the weight per strength category spruce may outbest even the
hardwoods.

I am going to test locust after I get a equal test piece, but I already know one
superior strength test of locust in that it dulls my chainsaw or any saw faster
than any wood I know of.

Soon I should have some numbers data on strength such as a weight-flex test, a
penetration test, a density test, etc.


Today I have some numbers:

I took 3 boards of 4,000 mm long by 170 mm wide by 25 mm thick of WhiteOak, Hickory
and WhiteAsh and put them through various tests of strength.

A weight test where a weight is placed in the middle of the board and WhiteAsh
flexed off center by 145 mm and Hickory flexed 106 mm and Oak flexed 70 mm. So Oak
is clearly the strongest and not Hickory!


STIFFEST.... is not Strongest.

The deflection under load measures stiffness.

The load required to cause fracture is a measure of strength.

STRENGTH isn't Stiffness.

It is technology.

Misuse of the basic terms helps make people believe you are dumb and
ignorant.

Use the terms correctly, then they will have to listen a little more
carefully to make the negative conclusion.

"Archimedes Plutonium" wrote in message
...

A weight test where a weight is placed in the middle of the board and
WhiteAsh
flexed off center by 145 mm and Hickory flexed 106 mm and Oak flexed 70
mm. So Oak
is clearly the strongest and not Hickory!

No, you've proved that Oak is the stiffest, not that it is the strongest.
You need to break the samples to find out which is strongest. A 4-point
bending test would be best.
--
Terry Harper
http://www.terry.harper.btinternet.co.uk/